Gurkha Rifles claim discrimination as MoD cuts 400 jobs

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Gurkha troops patrol through a village in Nahr e Saraj, HelmandGetty Images

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Soldiers of the Royal Gurkha Rifles wait to board a Chinook in AfghanistanRichard Pohle

Tom CoghlanDefence Correspondent

Published at 12:01AM, January 18 2012

Hundreds of elite Royal Gurkha Rifles are to be lose their jobs in the latest
round of Armed Forces cuts, the Ministry of Defence announced yesterday, as
veterans of the regiment accused the Government of discrimination.

Four hundred Gurkhas are among 2,900 members of the Army to be made redundant
in the second tranche of a rolling cuts programme. The manpower of Britain’s
ground forces is set to shrink from 102,000 to 84,000 by 2020.

A thousand members of the RAF and 300 Royal Navy personnel are also to be
dismissed in the coming months. The RAF and Navy have